AutoRP automates the distribution of group-to-rendezvous point (RP) mappings in a PIM network. To make AutoRP work, a device must be designated as an RP mapping agent, which receives the RP announcement messages from the RPs and arbitrates conflicts. The RP mapping agent then sends the consistent group-to-RP mappings to all other devices by way of dense mode flooding.

Thus, all routers automatically discover which RP to use for the groups they support. The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) has assigned two group addresses, 224.0.1.39 and 224.0.1.40, for AutoRP.

The mapping agent receives announcements of intention to become the RP from Candidate-RPs. The mapping agent then announces the winner of the RP election. This announcement is made independently of the decisions by the other mapping agents.

As shown in the figure, address scoping defines domain boundaries so that domains with RPs that have the same IP address do not leak into each other. Scoping is performed on the subnet boundaries within large domains and on the boundaries between the domain and the Internet.

Figure 1. Address Scoping at Boundaries

You can set up an administratively scoped boundary on an interface for multicast group addresses using the ip multicast boundary command with the access-list argument. A standard access list defines the range of addresses affected. When a boundary is set up, no multicast data packets are allowed to flow across the boundary from either direction. The boundary allows the same multicast group address to be reused in different administrative domains.

The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) has designated the multicast address range 239.0.0.0 to 239.255.255.255 as the administratively scoped addresses. This range of addresses can be reused in domains administered by different organizations. They would be considered local, not globally unique.

You can configure the filter-autorp keyword to examine and filter Auto-RP discovery and announcement messages at the administratively scoped boundary. Any Auto-RP group range announcements from the Auto-RP packets that are denied by the boundary access control list (ACL) are removed. An Auto-RP group range announcement is permitted and passed by the boundary only if all addresses in the Auto-RP group range are permitted by the boundary ACL. If any address is not permitted, the entire group range is filtered and removed from the Auto-RP message before the Auto-RP message is forwarded.

• Auto-RP allows any change to the RP designation to be configured only on the devices that are RPs, not on the leaf routers.
• Auto-RP offers the ability to scope the RP address within a domain.

PIM uses the BSR to discover and announce RP-set information for each group prefix to all the routers in a PIM domain. This is the same function performed by Auto-RP, but the BSR is part of the PIM Version 2 specification. The BSR mechanism interoperates with Auto-RP on Cisco routers.

To avoid a single point of failure, you can configure several candidate BSRs in a PIM domain. A BSR is elected among the candidate BSRs automatically; they use bootstrap messages to discover which BSR has the highest priority. This router then announces to all PIM routers in the PIM domain that it is the BSR.

Following the election of the BSR, candidate RPs use unicast to announce to the BSR their willingness to be the RP. The BSR advertises the entire group-to-RP mapping set to the router link local address 224.0.0.13. Unlike the RP mapping agent in Auto-RP, which is used by Auto-RP to select the RP, every router in the BSR network is responsible for selecting the RP.

BSR lacks the ability to scope RP advertisements; however, BSR is used when vendor interoperability or open standard adherence is a requirement.

A border interface in a PIM sparse mode domain requires precautions to prevent exchange of certain traffic with a neighboring domain reachable through that interface, especially if that domain is also running PIM sparse mode. BSR and Auto-RP messages should not be exchanged between different domains, because routers in one domain may elect RPs in the other domain, resulting in protocol malfunction or loss of isolation between the domains. Configure a BSR border interface to prevent BSR messages from being sent or received through an interface.

Source Specific Multicast (SSM) is a datagram delivery model that best supports one-to-many applications, also known as broadcast applications. SSM is a core networking technology for the Cisco implementation of IP multicast solutions targeted for audio and video broadcast application environments and is described in RFC 3569. The following two components together support the implementation of SSM:

• Protocol Independent Multicast source-specific mode (PIM-SSM)
• Internet Group Management Protocol Version 3 (IGMPv3)

Protocol Independent Multicast (PIM) SSM, or PIM-SSM, is the routing protocol that supports the implementation of SSM and is derived from PIM sparse mode (PIM-SM). IGMP is the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standards track protocol used for hosts to signal multicast group membership to routers. IGMP Version 3 supports source filtering, which is required for SSM. In order for SSM to run with IGMPv3, SSM must be supported in the device, the host where the application is running, and the application itself.

The standard IP multicast infrastructure in the Internet and many enterprise intranets is based on the PIM-SM protocol and Multicast Source Discovery Protocol (MSDP). These protocols have proved to be reliable, extensive, and efficient. However, they are bound to the complexity and functionality limitations of the Internet Standard Multicast (ISM) service model. For example, with ISM, the network must maintain knowledge about which hosts in the network are actively sending multicast traffic. With SSM, this information is provided by receivers through the source addresses relayed to the last-hop devices by IGMPv3. SSM is an incremental response to the issues associated with ISM and is intended to coexist in the network with the protocols developed for ISM. In general, SSM provides IP multicast service for applications that utilize SSM.

ISM service is described in RFC 1112. This service consists of the delivery of IP datagrams from any source to a group of receivers called the multicast host group. The datagram traffic for the multicast host group consists of datagrams with an arbitrary IP unicast source address S and the multicast group address G as the IP destination address. Systems will receive this traffic by becoming members of the host group. Membership in a host group simply requires signaling the host group through IGMP Version 1, 2, or 3.

In SSM, delivery of datagrams is based on (S, G) channels. Traffic for one (S, G) channel consists of datagrams with an IP unicast source address S and the multicast group address G as the IP destination address. Systems will receive this traffic by becoming members of the (S, G) channel. In both SSM and ISM, no signaling is required to become a source. However, in SSM, receivers must subscribe or unsubscribe to (S, G) channels to receive or not receive traffic from specific sources. In other words, receivers can receive traffic only from (S, G) channels to which they are subscribed, whereas in ISM, receivers need not know the IP addresses of sources from which they receive their traffic. The proposed standard approach for channel subscription signaling utilizes IGMP INCLUDE mode membership reports, which are supported only in IGMP Version 3.

SSM can coexist with the ISM service by applying the SSM delivery model to a configured subset of the IP multicast group address range. The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) has reserved the address range from 232.0.0.0 through 232.255.255.255 for SSM applications and protocols. The software allows SSM configuration for an arbitrary subset of the IP multicast address range from 224.0.0.0 through 239.255.255.255. When an SSM range is defined, an existing IP multicast receiver application will not receive any traffic when it tries to use addresses in the SSM range unless the application is modified to use explicit (S, G) channel subscription or is SSM-enabled through a URL Rendezvous Directory (URD).

An established network in which IP multicast service is based on PIM-SM can support SSM services. SSM can also be deployed alone in a network without the full range of protocols that are required for interdomain PIM-SM. That is, SSM does not require an RP, so there is no need for an RP mechanism such as Auto-RP, MSDP, or bootstrap router (BSR).

If SSM is deployed in a network that is already configured for PIM-SM, then only the last-hop devices must be upgraded to a software image that supports SSM. Routers that are not directly connected to receivers do not have to upgrade to a software image that supports SSM. In general, these non-last-hop devices must only run PIM-SM in the SSM range. They may need additional access control configuration to suppress MSDP signaling, registering, or PIM-SM shared-tree operations from occurring within the SSM range.

The SSM mode of operation is enabled by configuring the SSM range using the ip pim ssm global configuration command. This configuration has the following effects:

• For groups within the SSM range, (S, G) channel subscriptions are accepted through IGMPv3 INCLUDE mode membership reports.
• PIM operations within the SSM range of addresses change to PIM-SSM, a mode derived from PIM-SM. In this mode, only PIM (S, G) Join and Prune messages are generated by the device. Incoming messages related to rendezvous point tree (RPT) operations are ignored or rejected, and incoming PIM register messages are immediately answered with Register-Stop messages. PIM-SSM is backward-compatible with PIM-SM unless a device is a last-hop device. Therefore, devices that are not last-hop devices can run PIM-SM for SSM groups (for example, if they do not yet support SSM).
• For groups within the SSM range, no MSDP Source-Active (SA) messages within the SSM range will be accepted, generated, or forwarded.

IGMPv3 is the third version of the IETF standards track protocol in which hosts signal membership to last-hop devices of multicast groups. IGMPv3 introduces the ability for hosts to signal group membership that allows filtering capabilities with respect to sources. A host can signal either that it wants to receive traffic from all sources sending to a group except for some specific sources (a mode called EXCLUDE) or that it wants to receive traffic only from some specific sources sending to the group (a mode called INCLUDE).

IGMPv3 can operate with both ISM and SSM. In ISM, both EXCLUDE and INCLUDE mode reports are accepted by the last-hop router. In SSM, only INCLUDE mode reports are accepted by the last-hop router.

In PIM, packet traffic for a multicast group is routed according to the rules of the mode configured for that multicast group. The Cisco implementation of PIM supports four modes for a multicast group:

• PIM bidirectional mode
• PIM dense mode
• PIM sparse mode
• PIM Source Specific Mode (SSM)

A router can simultaneously support all four modes or any combination of them for different multicast groups.

In bidirectional mode, traffic is routed only along a bidirectional shared tree that is rooted at the rendezvous point (RP) for the group. In bidir-PIM, the IP address of the RP acts as the key to having all routers establish a loop-free spanning tree topology rooted in that IP address. This IP address need not be a router, but can be any unassigned IP address on a network that is reachable throughout the PIM domain. This technique is the preferred configuration method for establishing a redundant RP configuration for bidir-PIM.

Membership in a bidirectional group is signaled by way of explicit Join messages. Traffic from sources is unconditionally sent up the shared tree toward the RP and passed down the tree toward the receivers on each branch of the tree.

The figures below show the difference in state created per router for a unidirectional shared tree and source tree versus a bidirectional shared tree.

Figure 2. Unidirectional Shared Tree and Source Tree

Figure 3. Bidirectional Shared Tree

For packets that are forwarded downstream from the RP toward receivers, there are no fundamental differences between bidir-PIM and PIM-SM. Bidir-PIM deviates substantially from PIM-SM for traffic that is passed from sources upstream toward the RP.

PIM-SM cannot forward traffic in the upstream direction of a tree because it accepts traffic from only one Reverse Path Forwarding (RPF) interface. This interface (for the shared tree) points toward the RP, thus allowing only downstream traffic flow. Upstream traffic is first encapsulated into unicast register messages, which are passed from the designated router (DR) of the source toward the RP. Second, the RP joins an SPT that is rooted at the source. Therefore, in PIM-SM, traffic from sources destined for the RP does not flow upstream in the shared tree, but downstream along the SPT of the source until it reaches the RP. From the RP, traffic flows along the shared tree toward all receivers.

In bidir-PIM, the packet-forwarding rules have been improved over PIM-SM, allowing traffic to be passed up the shared tree toward the RP. To avoid multicast packet looping, bidir-PIM introduces a new mechanism called designated forwarder (DF) election, which establishes a loop-free SPT rooted at the RP.

On every network segment and point-to-point link, all PIM routers participate in a procedure called designated forwarder (DF) election. The procedure selects one router as the DF for every RP of bidirectional groups. This router is responsible for forwarding multicast packets received on that network.

The DF election is based on unicast routing metrics. The router with the most preferred unicast routing metric to the RP becomes the DF. Use of this method ensures that only one copy of every packet will be sent to the RP, even if there are parallel equal-cost paths to the RP.

A DF is selected for every RP of bidirectional groups. As a result, multiple routers may be elected as DF on any network segment, one for each RP. Any particular router may be elected as DF on more than one interface.

The procedure for joining the shared tree of a bidirectional group is almost identical to that used in PIM-SM. One main difference is that, for bidirectional groups, the role of the DR is assumed by the DF for the RP.

On a network that has local receivers, only the router elected as the DF populates the outgoing interface list (olist) upon receiving Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP) Join messages, and sends (*, G) Join and Leave messages upstream toward the RP. When a downstream router wishes to join the shared tree, the RPF neighbor in the PIM Join and Leave messages is always the DF elected for the interface that lead to the RP.

When a router receives a Join or Leave message, and the router is not the DF for the receiving interface, the message is ignored. Otherwise, the router updates the shared tree in the same way as in sparse mode.

In a network where all routers support bidirectional shared trees, (S, G) Join and Leave messages are ignored. There is also no need to send PIM assert messages because the DF election procedure eliminates parallel downstream paths from any RP. An RP never joins a path back to the source, nor will it send any register stops.

A router creates (*, G) entries only for bidirectional groups. The olist of a (*, G) entry includes all the interfaces for which the router has been elected DF and that have received either an IGMP or PIM Join message. If a router is located on a sender-only branch, it will also create a (*, G) state, but the olist will not include any interfaces.

If a packet is received from the RPF interface toward the RP, the packet is forwarded downstream according to the olist of the (*, G) entry. Otherwise, only the router that is the DF for the receiving interface forwards the packet upstream toward the RP; all other routers must discard the packet.

• Bidir-PIM removes the performance cost of maintaining a routing state table for a large number of sources.
• Bidir-PIM is designed to be used for many-to-many applications within individual PIM domains. Multicast groups in bidirectional PIM mode can scale to an arbitrary number of sources without incurring overhead due to the number of sources.

Proceed to the “ Verifying IP Multicast Operation ” module.

Proceed to the “ Verifying IP Multicast Operation ” module.

Proceed to the “ Verifying IP Multicast Operation ” module.

Proceed to the “ Verifying IP Multicast Operation ” module.

Proceed to the “ Verifying IP Multicast Operation ” module.